URIteacherknowledge - Lesson 4 Jon

Rhode Island Department of Education
Lesson Plan

Lesson Title: Design-A-Building

Context of Lesson:

In this lesson, students will first read a short segment from the book involving why buildings fall during earthquakes. The reading explains what the best size, shape, and support system would best resist the effects of an earthquake. As a class, we'll then use an interactive online program that allows you to test the effects an earthquake has on different kinds of soil. Students will choose which combinations to try, and we'll be able to determine what soil is the best and worst at resisting the effects of earthquakes. Students will then design their own building on a worksheet, where students will both sketch and explain the features of their building that makes it earthquake resistant. Once this is completed, we'll have a brief 5 minute discussion on the different features the students included and why they did. Lastly, we'll cover new material on the smart board which will include explanations of what a seismograph, seismologist, seismogram, and two scales used to measure the intensity of earthquakes: the Richter Scale and the Mercalli Scale

Opportunities to Learn:

Depth of Knowledge

Webbs Depth of Knowledge
Level 1: Recall and Reproduction

Students will be able to recognize the terms used for people and graphs involved in recording earthquake waves

Level 2: Skills and Concepts

Students will be able to describe and explain the 2 ways to measure earthquakes and explain how these measurements are made.

Prerequisite Knowledge

During this lesson, students can refer back to the video we watched in the first lesson that introduced this topic. Students can recall the experiences that people shared and in the video and the images they saw of the buildings. They can also use the knowledge obtained in the inquiry lab involving the effect primary and secondary waves have on the surface.

Materials

Forces of Nature (earthquakes, stage 7)
Footage of Earthquakes

Objectives:

Students will be able to identify the which type of ground most resists the effects of earthquakes
Students will be able to demonstrate their understanding on ways of minimizing the effects of earthquakes by drawing a building with earthquake resistant features
Students will be able to identify the two ways to measure earthquakes and the terms for people that study earthquakes

Instruction:

Opening:

Question of the Day
- "An earthquake occurs 150 miles from your house. Which earthquake wave will you feel first? Which earthquake wave could cause more damage to your house?”
- Bonus: “List two things you could change about your house that would help minimize the damage from an earthquake.”
Quiz
- Short quiz on labeling the parts of an earthquake and matching definitions. Helps reinforce what was learned so far and a chance to identify any misconceptions before the unit test.

Engagement:

Designing Earthquake-Resistant Buildings
- As a class, read pages 130 and 131 in the textbook, periodically stopping to highlight the following key points:
  - Reasons buildings fall
    - old buildings
    - size and shape
    - open or unsupported
  - *Wait to discuss the ground
- Forces of Nature (earthquakes, stage 7)
  - Ask students to choose first which combination would result in the least amount of damage, the most amount of damage, and any reasons that they believe this. Try each combination with students guiding them to the correct answer by pointing out key observations (building looks like it will fall when on landfill, building doesn't seem to move much when on bedrock, etc.)
  - Come to a conclusion as a class ranking the surfaces from best to worst for resisting earthquakes.
Design-A-Building
- Give students a worksheet in which they will design their own earthquake resistant building (drawing) highlighting at least 10 features that will resist damage in an earthquake.
  - During the instruction for this assignment, ask students to think about where the building is located, what the building is made of, and things inside the building that can
    - Footage of Earthquakes
    - Remind students to think back to the first lesson, where this video clip was seen. It's only 47 seconds long so showing it again quickly would help students remember things flying around the room can cause significant damage.
    - Also, tell students they can walk around the room to get ideas. They will have 25 minutes to complete this assignment.

Students will pass their sheets in and we'll have a 5 minute discussion on things students found important to include. We'll also talk about what surfaces students chose and what their buildings were made of, also offering advice to other students who may have picked solutions that wouldn't have minimized the affects of the earthquakes.

New Material
- New material will be presented as notes on the smartboard. Here students will learn terms such as a seismograph, seismologist, seismogram, and learning what the two measurement systems that are used to measure earthquakes: the Richter scale and the Mercalli Scale.
- We'll also discuss the damage factors in earthquakes including the strength of the earthquake, type of rock and soil in the area (refer back to earlier with online activity), population of the area, type of buildings and the time at which the earthquake occurs.
  - During the damage factors part, I'll ask students to think back to the movie comparing the Kobe and California earthquakes and think about these factors.
- Show students how to find where the epicenter of an earthquake is by recording earthquake waves at 3 different locations.

Closure

Recap what we covered today, which soil would effect a house the most and least during an earthquake, the terms used for people and things that record earthquakes, and the 2 measurement systems used to measure earthquakes.

Assessment

The design-a-building activity will be used to assess students knowledge on how much they understand on minimizing the effects of earthquakes. We've covered this material form the first day of the unit, progressively building on it piece by piece. Today we covered most of this material, so what we covered should be fresh in their mind. This assignment will be counted as an in-class assignment and students will be graded both on the drawing and their explanation.

Lesson 4 Jon